Washington, Sept 09: Faced with angry complaints from some of its closest allies, the US State Department said it may put off by one year a requirement that those countries issue machine-readable passports to their citizens wanting to enter the United States without a visa. Washington had been set to bar visaless entry to citizens of 26 of the 27 countries now eligible to enter the United States without a visa as of October 1 unless the biographical data on their passports could be scanned by computer.
But after negative reaction from many of the affected countries, the State Department said Secretary of State Colin Powell is prepared to allow one-time extensions to the deadline on a case-by-case basis.
Powell "is considering postponing until October 26, 2004, the requirement that each visa waiver programme traveller must present a machine-readable passport at a us port of entry to be admitted to the country without a visa," said Melinda Sofen, a department spokeswoman.
For a nation's citizens to be covered by a possible delay in the requirement she said that country must send a formal "diplomatic note" to the united states vowing that its non-machine-readable passports will be protected against misuse and that it will accept the postponement is only for one year.

Powell "has not yet made a final decision to grant this postponement to any country's passport holders," Sofen said.

Bureau Report